*140. Public Bills: First and Second Readings.*--The steps through which a public bill, whether introduced by the Government or by a private member, must pa.s.s in the Commons are still numerous, but by the reduction of some of them to sheer formalities which involve neither debate nor vote the actual legislative process has been made much more expeditious than once it was. The necessary stages in the enactment of a bill in either house are, as a rule, five: first reading, second reading, consideration by committee, report from committee, and third reading. Formerly the introduction of a measure involved almost invariably a speech explaining at length the nature of the proposal, followed by a debate and a vote, sometimes consuming, in all, several sittings. Nowadays only very important Government bills are introduced in this manner. In the case of all other bills the first reading has become a mere formality, involving nothing more than a motion on the part of a member, official or private, for permission to bring in a measure and the giving of leave by the House, almost invariably without discussion. Upon all measures save the most important Government projects, opportunity for debate is first afforded at the second reading, although the discussion at this stage must relate to general principles rather than to details. By the adoption of a motion that the bill be read a second time "this day six months" (or at some other date falling beyond the antic.i.p.ated limits of the session) a measure may at this point be killed.
*141. Public Bills: Later Stages.*--A bill which survives the (p. 134) second reading is "committed." Prior to 1907 it would go normally to the Committee of the Whole. Nowadays it goes there if it is a money bill or a bill for confirming a provisional order,[196] or if, on other grounds, the House so directs; otherwise it goes to one of the four standing committees, a.s.signment being made by the Speaker. This is the stage at which the provisions of the measure are considered in detail and amendments are introduced. After the second reading, however, a bill may be referred to a select committee, and in the event that this is done a step is added to the process, for after being returned by the select committee the measure goes to the Committee of the Whole or to one of the standing committees. Eventually the bill is reported back to the House. If reported by a standing committee or, in amended form by the Committee of the Whole, it is considered by the House afresh and in some detail; otherwise, the "report stage" is omitted.
Finally comes the third reading, the question now being whether the House approves the measure as a whole. At this stage any amendment beyond verbal changes necessitates recommitment. The carrying of a measure through these successive stages is spread over, as a rule, several days, and sometimes several weeks, but it is not impossible that the entire process be completed during the period of a sitting.
Having been adopted by the originating house, a bill is taken by a clerk to the other house, there to be subjected to substantially the same procedure. If amendments are introduced, it is sent back in order that the suggested changes may be considered by the first house. If they are agreed to, the measure is sent up for the royal approval. If they are rejected and an agreement between the two houses cannot be reached, the measure falls.[197]
[Footnote 196: See p. 138.]
[Footnote 197: The legislative process is summed up aptly by Lowell as follows: "Leaving out of account the first reading, which rarely involves a real debate, the ordinary course of a public bill through the House of Commons gives, therefore, an opportunity for two debates upon its general merits, and between them two discussions of its details, or one debate upon the details if that one results in no changes, or if the bill has been referred to a standing committee. When the House desires to collect evidence it does so after approving of the general principle, and before taking up the details. Stated in this way the whole matter is plain and rational enough. It is, in fact, one of the many striking examples of adaptation in the English political system. A collection of rules that appear c.u.mbrous and antiquated, and that even now are well-nigh incomprehensible when described in all their involved technicality, have been pruned away until they furnish a procedure almost as simple, direct, and appropriate as any one could devise."
Government of England, I., 277-278. The procedure of the House of Commons on public bills is described in Lowell, Government of England, I., Chaps. 13, 17, 19; Anson, Law and Custom of the Const.i.tution, I., 240-267; Low, Governance of England, Chap. 4; Moran, English Government, Chap.
14; Marriott, English Political Inst.i.tutions, Chap.
113; Todd, Parliamentary Government, II., 138-163; Ilbert, Parliament, Chap. 3; Redlich, Procedure of the House of Commons, III., 85-112; and May, Treatise on the Law, Privileges, Proceedings, and Usage of Parliament, Chap. 18. See also G. Walpole, House of Commons Procedure, with Notes on American Practice (London, 1902), and C. P. Ilbert, Legislative Methods and Forms (Oxford, 1901), 77-121.]
*142. Money Bills: Appropriation and Finance Acts.*--The (p. 135) procedure followed in the handling of money bills differs materially from that which has been described. Underlying it are two fundamental principles, incorporated in the standing orders of the House of Commons during the first quarter of the eighteenth century. One of them prescribes that no pet.i.tion or motion for the granting of money shall be proceeded upon save in Committee of the Whole. The other forbids the receiving of any pet.i.tion, or the proceeding upon any motion, for a charge upon the public revenue unless recommended from the crown. Although these principles apply technically only to appropriations, they have long been observed with equal fidelity in respect to the raising of revenue. All specific measures for the expending of money and all proposals for the imposing of fresh taxation or the increase of existing taxation must emanate from the crown, i.e., in practice from the cabinet. A private member may go no further in this direction than to introduce resolutions of a wholly general character favoring some particular kind of expenditure, except that it is within his right to move to repeal or to reduce taxes which the Government has not proposed to modify.
Two great fiscal measures are introduced and carried through annually: the Appropriation Act, in which are brought together all the grants for the public services for the year, and the Finance Act in which are comprised all regulations relating to the revenue and the national debt. Before the close of the fiscal year (March 31) the ministry submits to the Commons a body of estimates for the "supply services,"
drawn up originally by the government departments, scrutinized by the Treasury, and approved by the cabinet. Early in the session the House resolves itself into a Committee of the Whole on Supply, by which resolutions of supply are discussed, adopted, and reported. These resolutions are embodied in bills which, for purposes of convenience, are pa.s.sed at intervals during the session. But at the close all of them are consolidated in one grand Appropriation Act.[198] Upwards of half of the public expenditures, it is to be observed, e.g., the Civil List, the salaries of judges, pensions, and interest on the national debt, are provided for by permanent acts imposing charges (p. 136) upon the Consolidated Fund and do not come annually under parliamentary review.
[Footnote 198: Before the lapse of a twelvemonth unforeseen contingencies require invariably the voting of "supplementary grants."]
*143. The Budget.*--As soon as practicable after the close of the fiscal year the House, resolved for the purpose into Committee of Ways and Means, receives from the Chancellor of the Exchequer his Budget, or annual statement of accounts. The statement comprises regularly three parts: a review of revenue and expenditure during the year just closed, a provisional balance-sheet for the year to come, and a series of proposals for the remission, modification, or fresh imposition of taxes. Revenues, as expenditures, are in large part "permanent," yet a very considerable proportion are provided for through the medium of yearly votes. In Committee of Ways and Means the House considers the Chancellor"s proposals, and after they have been reported back and embodied in a bill they are carried with the a.s.sent of the crown, though no longer necessarily of the Lords, into law. Prior to 1861 it was customary to include in the fiscal resolutions and in the bill in which they were embodied only the annual and temporary taxes, but in consequence of the Lords" rejection, in 1860, of a separate finance bill repealing the duties on paper it was made the practice to incorporate in a single bill--the so-called Finance Bill--provision for all taxes, whether temporary or permanent. In practice the House of Commons rarely refuses to approve the financial measures recommended by the Government. The chamber has no power to propose either expenditure or taxation, and the right which it possesses to refuse or to reduce the levies and the appropriations asked for is seldom used. "Financially," says Lowell, "its work is rather supervision than direction; and its real usefulness consists in securing publicity and criticism rather than in controlling expenditure."[199] The theory underlying fiscal procedure has been summed up lucidly as follows: "The Crown demands money, the Commons grant it, and the Lords a.s.sent to the grant;[200] but the Commons do not vote money unless it be required by the Crown; nor impose or augment taxes unless they be necessary for meeting the supplies which they have voted or are about to vote, and for supplying general deficiencies in the revenue. The Crown has no concern in the nature or distribution of the taxes; but the foundation of all Parliamentary taxation is its necessity for the public service as declared by the Crown through its const.i.tutional advisers."[201]
[Footnote 199: Government of England, I., 288.]
[Footnote 200: Since the enactment of the Parliament Bill of 1911, as has been observed, the a.s.sent of the Lords is not necessary. See p. 112.]
[Footnote 201: The procedure involved in the handling of money bills is described in Lowell, Government of England, I., Chap. 14; Anson, Law and Custom of the Const.i.tution, I., 268-281; Walpole, Electorate and Legislature, Chap. 7; Todd, Parliamentary Government, II., 186-271; Ilbert, Parliament, Chap. 4; Redlich, Procedure of the House of Commons, III., 113-174; May, Treatise on the Law, Privileges, Proceedings, and Usage of Parliament, Chap. 21. See also E. Porritt, Amendments in the House of Commons Procedure since 1881, in _American Political Science Review_, Nov., 1908. Among numerous works on taxation in England the standard authority is S. Dowell, History of Taxation and Taxes in England from the Earliest Times to the Year 1885, 4 vols. (2d ed., London, 1888).]
*144. Private Bills: Nature and Procedure.*--In the matter of (p. 137) procedure there is no distinction between a Government bill and a private member"s bill. Both are public bills. But a private bill is handled in a manner largely peculiar to itself. A public bill is one which affects the general interests of the state, and which has for its object presumably the promotion of the common good. A private bill is one which has in view the interest of some particular locality, person, or collection of persons. The commonest object of private bills is to enable private individuals to enter into combination to undertake works of public utility--the building of railways or tramways, the construction of harbors or piers, the draining of swamps, the supplying of water, gas, or electricity, and the embarking upon a wide variety of other enterprises which in the United States would be regulated chiefly by state legislatures and city councils--at their own risk and, in part at least, for their own profit. All private bills originate in pet.i.tions, which must be submitted in advance of the opening of the session during which they are to be considered. Their presentation and the various stages of their progress are governed by very detailed and stringent regulations, and fees are required from both promoters and opponents, so that the enactment of a private bill of importance becomes for the parties directly concerned an expensive process, and for the Exchequer a source of no inconsiderable amount of revenue.
After having been scrutinized and approved by parliamentary officials known as Examiners of Pet.i.tions for Private Bills, a private bill is introduced in one of the two houses.[202] Its introduction is equivalent to its first reading. At its second reading debate may take place upon the principle of the measure, after which the bill, if opposed, is referred to a Private Bill Committee consisting of four members and a disinterested referee. If the bill be not opposed, i.e., if no adverse pet.i.tion has been filed by property owners, corporations, or other interests, the committee of reference, under a standing order of 1903, consists of the Chairman and Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means, two other members of the House, appointed by (p. 138) the Committee of Selection, and the Counsel to Mr. Speaker. The committee stage of a contested bill a.s.sumes an essentially judicial aspect. Promoters and opponents are represented by counsel, witnesses are examined, and expert testimony is taken. After being reported by committee, the measure goes its way under the same regulations as those controlling the progress of public bills.
[Footnote 202: To facilitate their consideration, such measures are distributed approximately equally between the two houses. This is done through conference of the Chairmen of Committees of the two houses, or their counsel, prior to the a.s.sembling of Parliament.]
*145. Provisional Orders.*--Two things are, however, to be noted. The first one is that while in theory the distinction between a public and a private bill is clear, in point of fact there is no little difficulty in drawing a line of demarcation, and the result has been the recognition of an indefinite cla.s.s of "hybrid" bills, partly public and partly private in content and handled under some circ.u.mstances as the one and under others as the other, or even under a procedure combining features of both. The second fact to be observed is that, in part to reduce expense and in part to procure the good-will of the executive department concerned, it has become common for the promoters of enterprises requiring parliamentary sanction to make use of the device known as provisional orders. A provisional order is an order issued, after minute investigation, by a government department authorizing provisionally the undertaking of a project in behalf of which application has been made. It requires eventually the sanction of Parliament, but such orders are laid before the houses in groups by the several departments and their ratification is virtually a.s.sured in advance. It is pointed out by Lowell that during the years 1898-1901 not one-tenth of the provisional orders laid before Parliament were opposed, and but one failed of adoption.[203]
[Footnote 203: Government of England, I., 385. On private bill legislation see Lowell, I., Chap. 20; Anson, Law and Custom of the Const.i.tution, I, 291-300; May, Treatise on the Law, Privileges, Proceedings, and Usage of Parliament, Chaps. 24-29; Courtney, Working Const.i.tution of the United Kingdom, Chap. 18; MacDonaugh, The Book of Parliament, 398-420. The standard treatise upon the subject is F. Clifford, History of Private Bill Legislation, 2 vols. (London, 1885-1887). A recent book of value is F. H. Spencer, Munic.i.p.al Origins; an Account of English Private Bill Legislation relating to Local Government, 1740-1835, with a Chapter on Private Bill Procedure (London, 1911).]
VII. THE CONDUCT OF BUSINESS IN THE TWO HOUSES
"How can I learn the rules of the Commons?" was a question once put by an Irish member to Mr. Parnell. "By breaking them," was the philosophic reply. Representing, as it does, an acc.u.mulation through centuries of deliberately adopted regulations, interwoven and overlaid with unwritten custom, the code of procedure by which the conduct of business in the House of Commons is governed is indeed intricate (p. 139) and forbidding. Lord Palmerston admitted that he never fully mastered it, and Gladstone was not infrequently an inadvertent offender against the "rules of the House." Prior to the nineteenth century the rules were devised, as is pointed out by Anson, with two objects in view: to protect the House from hasty and ill-considered action pressed forward by the king"s ministers, and to secure fair play between the parties in the chamber and a hearing for all. It was not until 1811 that business of the Government was permitted to obtain recognized precedence on certain days; but the history of the procedure of the Commons since that date is a record of (1) the general reduction of the time during which private members may indulge in the discussion of subjects or measures lying outside the Government"s legislative programme, (2) increasing limitation of the opportunity for raising general questions at the various stages of Government business, and (3) the cutting down of the time allowed for discussing at all the projects to which the Government asks the chambers" a.s.sent.[204]
[Footnote 204: Anson, Law and Custom of the Const.i.tution, I., 253.]
*146. Rules.*--The rules governing debate and decorum are not only elaborate but, in some instances, of great antiquity. In so far as they have been reduced to writing they may be said to comprise (1) "standing orders" of a permanent character, (2) "sessional orders,"
operative during a session only, and (3) "general orders,"
indeterminate in respect to period of application. In the course of debate all remarks are addressed to the Speaker and in the event that the floor is desired by more than one member it rests with the Speaker to designate, with scrupulous impartiality, who shall have it. When a "division" is in progress and the doors are closed members speak seated and covered, but at all other times they speak standing and uncovered. A speech may not be read from ma.n.u.script, and it is within the competence of the Speaker not only to warn a member against irrelevance or repet.i.tion but to compel him to terminate his remarks.[205] A member whose conduct is reprehensible may be ordered to withdraw and, upon vote of the House, may be suspended from service. Except in committee, a member may not speak twice upon the same question, although he may be allowed the floor a second time to explain a portion of his speech which has been misunderstood. Undue obstruction is not tolerated, and the Speaker may decline to put a motion which he considers dilatory.
[Footnote 205: On parliamentary oratory see Graham, The Mother of Parliaments, 203-224.]
*147. Closure and the Guillotine.*--For the further limitation of debate two important and drastic devices are at all times available. One is ordinary closure and the other is "the guillotine." Closure dates originally from 1881. It was introduced in the standing orders of (p. 140) the House in 1882, and it a.s.sumed its present form in 1888.[206] It sprang from the efforts of the House to curb the intolerably obstructionist tactics employed a generation ago by the Irish Nationalists, but by reason of the increasing ma.s.s of business to be disposed of and the tendency of large deliberative bodies to waste time, it has been found too useful to be given up. "After a question has been proposed," reads Standing Order 26, "a member rising in his place may claim to move "that the Question be now put," and unless it shall appear to the Chair that such motion is an abuse of the Rules of the House, or an infringement of the rights of the minority, the Question "that the Question be now put" shall be put forthwith and decided without amendment or debate." Discussion may thus be cut off instantly and a vote precipitated. Closure is inoperative, however, unless the number of members voting in the majority for its adoption is at least one hundred, or, in a standing committee, twenty.
A more generally effective device by which discussion is limited and the transaction of business is facilitated is that known as "closure by compartments," or "the guillotine." When this is employed the House in advance of the consideration of a bill agrees upon an allotment of time to the various parts or stages of the measure, and at the expiration of each period debate, whether concluded or not, is closed, a vote is taken, and a majority adopts that portion of the bill upon which the guillotine has fallen. In recent years this device has been employed almost invariably when an important Government bill is reserved for consideration in Committee of the Whole. Its advantage is the saving of time and the ensuring that by a given date final action upon a measure shall have been taken. Prior to the middle of the nineteenth century liberty of discussion in the Commons was all but unrestrained, save by what an able authority on English parliamentary practice has termed "the self-imposed parliamentary discipline of the parties."[206] The enormous change which has come about is attributable to two princ.i.p.al causes, congestion of business and the rise of obstructionism. The effect has been, among other things, to accentuate party differences and to involve occasional disregard of the rights of minorities.[207]
[Footnote 206: The name was first employed in 1887.]
[Footnote 207: Redlich, Procedure of the House of Commons, I., 133-212; Graham, The Mother of Parliaments, 158-172. An excellent ill.u.s.tration of the use of the guillotine is afforded by the history of the pa.s.sage of the National Insurance Bill of 1911. See _Annual Register_ (1911), 232-236.]
*148. Votes and Divisions.*--When debate upon the whole or a portion of a measure is terminated there takes place a vote, which may or may not involve, technically, a "division." The Speaker or Chairman (p. 141) states the question to be voted upon and calls for the ayes and noes.
He announces the apparent result and, if his decision is not challenged, the vote is so recorded. If, however, any member objects, strangers are asked to withdraw (save from the places reserved for them), electric bells are rung throughout the building, the two-minute sand-gla.s.s is turned, and at the expiration of the time the doors are locked. The question is then repeated and another oral vote is taken.
If there is still lack of acquiescence in the announced result, the Speaker orders a division. The ayes pa.s.s into the lobby at the Speaker"s right and the noes into that at his left, and all are counted by four tellers designated by the Speaker, two from each side, as the members return to their places in the chamber. This method of taking a division has undergone but little change since 1836. Under a standing order of 1888 the Speaker is empowered, in the event that he considers a demand for a division dilatory or irresponsible, to call upon the ayes and noes to rise in their places and be counted; but there is seldom occasion for resort to this variation from the established practice. The device of "pairing" is not unknown, and when the question is one of political moment the fact is made obvious by the activity of the party "whips" in behalf of the interests which they represent.[208]
[Footnote 208: On the conduct of business in the Commons see Lowell, Government of England, I, Chaps. 15-16; Moran, English Government, Chap. 15; Walpole, Electorate and Legislature, Chap. 8; Ilbert, Parliament, Chap. 5; Redlich, Procedure of the House of Commons, II., 215-264, III., 1-41; May, Treatise on the Law, Privileges, Proceedings, and Usage of Parliament, Chaps, 8-12; Medley, Manual of English Const.i.tutional History, 231-284; Graham, The Mother of Parliaments, 225-258; and MacDonaugh, The Book of Parliament, 217-247.]
*149. Procedure in the Lords.*--The rules of procedure of the House of Lords are in theory simple, and in practice yet more so. Nominally, all measures of importance, after being read twice, are considered in Committee of the Whole, referred to a standing committee for textual revision, reported, and accorded final adoption or rejection. In practice the process is likely to be abbreviated. Few bills, for example, are actually referred to the revision committee. For the examination of such measures as seem to require it committees are const.i.tuted for the session, and others are created from time to time as need of them appears, but the comparative leisure of the chamber permits debate within the Committee of the Whole upon any measure which the members really care to discuss. Willful obstruction is all but unknown, so that there has never been occasion for the adoption of any form of closure. Important questions are decided, as a rule, by a division. When the question is put those members who desire to register an affirmative vote repair to the lobby at the right of (p. 142) the woolsack, those who are opposed to the proposal take their places in the corresponding lobby at the left, and both groups are counted by tellers appointed by the presiding officer. A member may abstain from voting by taking his station on "the steps of the throne," technically accounted outside the chamber. Prior to 1868 absent members were allowed to vote by proxy, but this indefensible privilege, abolished by standing order in the year mentioned, is likely never to be revived.[209]
[Footnote 209: On the conduct of business in the Lords see Anson, Law and Custom of the Const.i.tution, I., 281-291.]
CHAPTER VII (p. 143)
POLITICAL PARTIES
I. PARLIAMENTARISM AND THE PARTY SYSTEM
*150. Government by Party.*--Intimately connected with the parliamentary scheme of government which has been described is the characteristic British system of government by party. Indeed, not merely is there between the two an intimate connection; they are but different aspects of the same working arrangement. The public affairs of the kingdom at any given time, as has appeared, are managed by the body of ministers, acting with and through a supporting majority in the House of Commons.
These ministers belong to one or the other of the two great political parties, with only occasional and incidental representation of minor affiliated political groups. Their supporters in the Commons are, in the main, their fellow-partisans, and their tenure of power is dependent upon the fortunes of their party in Parliament and throughout the country. They are at once the working executive, the guiding agency in legislation, and the leaders and spokesmen of this party. Confronting them constantly is the Opposition, consisting of influential exponents of the contrary political faith who, in turn, lead the rank and file of their party organization; and if at any time the ministers in power lose their supporting majority in the Commons, whether through adverse results of a national election or otherwise, they retire and the Opposition a.s.sumes office. The parliamentary system and the party system are thus inextricably related, the one being, indeed, historically the product of the other. It was princ.i.p.ally through the agency of party spirit, party contest, and party unity that there was established by degrees that single and collective responsibility of ministers which lies at the root of parliamentary government; and, but for the coherence and stability with which political activity is invested by party organization, the operation of the parliamentary system would be an impossibility. The law of the British const.i.tution does not demand the existence of parties; on the contrary, it affords them no recognition or place. The conventions, however, both a.s.sume and require them.
*151. Two-Party Organization.*--The relationship which subsists (p. 144) between parliamentarism and party government is to be accounted for in no small measure by the fact that the number of great parties in the United Kingdom is but two. Certain continental nations, notably France and Italy, possess the forms of parliamentary government, adopted within times comparatively recent and taken over largely from Great Britain. In these countries, however, the multiplicity of parties effectually prevents the operation of the parliamentary system in the fashion in which that system operates across the Channel. Ministries must be made up invariably of representatives of a number of essentially independent groups. They are apt to be in-harmonious, to be able to execute but indifferently the composite will of the Government coalition in the popular chamber, and, accordingly, to be short-lived. Despite the rise in recent decades of the Irish Nationalist and Labor groups, it is still true in Great Britain, as it has been since political parties first made their appearance there, that two leading party affiliations divide between themselves the allegiance of the ma.s.s of the nation. The defeat of one means the triumph of the other, and either alone is competent normally to govern independently if elevated to power. This means, on the one hand, a much more thoroughgoing predominance of the governing party than can be acquired by a single party in France or Italy and, on the other hand, a unique concentration of responsibility and, in turn, an increased responsiveness to the public will. The leaders of the one party for the time in the ascendancy govern the nation, by reason of the fact that, _being_ the leaders of this party, they are selected without doubt or equivocation to fill the princ.i.p.al offices of state.[210]
[Footnote 210: For a fuller exposition of the relations of party and the parliamentary system see Lowell, Government of England, I., Chap. 24. The best description of English parties and party machinery is that contained in Chaps. 24-37 of President Lowell"s volumes. The growth of parties and of party organization is discussed with fullness and with admirable temper in M.
Ostrogorski, Democracy and the Organization of Political Parties, trans. by F. Clarke, 2 vols.
(London, 1902). A valuable monograph is A. L.
Lowell, The Influence of Party upon Legislation in England and America, in _Annual Report of American Historical a.s.sociation for 1901_ (Washington, 1902), I., 319-542. An informing study is E.
Porritt, The Break-up of the English Party System, in _Annals of American Academy of Political and Social Science_, V., No. 4 (Jan., 1895), and an incisive criticism is H. Belloc and H. Chesterton, The Party System (London, 1911). There is no adequate history of English political parties from their origins to the present day. G. W. Cooke, The History of Party from the Rise of the Whig and Tory factions in the Reign of Charles II. to the Pa.s.sing of the Reform Bill, 3 vols. (London, 1836-1837) covers the subject satisfactorily to the end of the last unreformed parliament. Other party histories--as T. E. Kebbel, History of Toryism (London, 1886); C. B. R. Kent, The English Radicals (London, 1899); W. Harris, History of the Radical Party in Parliament (London, 1885); and J. B. Daly, The Dawn of Radicalism (London, 1892)--cover important but restricted fields. An admirable work which deals with party organization as well as with party principles is R. S. Watson, The National Liberal Federation from its Commencement to the General Election of 1906 (London, 1907). For further party histories see p. 160, 166.]
II. PARTIES IN THE LATER EIGHTEENTH AND EARLIER NINETEENTH (p. 145) CENTURIES
*152. Whigs and Tories.*--The seventeenth-century origins of political parties in England, the development of Whigs and Tories following the Revolution of 1688-1689, and the prolonged Whig supremacy during the reigns of George I. and George II., have been alluded to in another place.[211] During the eighteenth century the parliamentary system was but slowly coming into its own, and again and again party lines all but disappeared. The recurring rivalry of Whig and Tory elements, however, brought about gradually a habitual recognition of the responsibility of ministers, and this responsibility, in turn, reacted to accentuate party demarcation. The efforts of George III. to revive the royal prerogative had the effect of calling into existence a body of new Tories, not Jacobite, but Hanoverian, who supported the king in his purpose, and at the same time, of driving the forces of opposition to a closer union and more constant vigilance. Throughout the century the tone of party politics was continuously low. Bribery and other forms of corruption were rife, and the powers of government, both national and local, were in the hands regularly of an aristocratic minority which ruled in its own interest. The high-water mark of intrigue was reached in 1783 when the old Tories, led by Lord North, allied themselves with the old Whigs, led by Charles James Fox, to retain power and to curtail the influence of the king. The coalition was unsuccessful, and the defeat of Fox"s India Bill, in December, 1783, became the occasion of the younger Pitt"s elevation to the premiership, followed within three months by a national election which precipitated an end of the seventy years of Whig ascendancy.
[Footnote 211: See p. 39.]
*153. The Tory Ascendancy, 1783-1830.*--Throughout the ensuing forty-six years, or until 1830, the new Tory party continued almost uninterruptedly in power, although it is to be observed that after 1790 the composition and character of this party underwent important modification. The first decade of the period covered by the Pitt ministry (1784-1801) was a time of incipient but active propaganda in behalf of const.i.tutional, financial, and social reform, and the government was not disinclined to favor a number of the changes which were projected. The outbreak and progress of the Revolution in (p. 146) France, however, completely altered the situation. The great landowners, who const.i.tuted the dominating element in the Whig party, detested the principles of the Revolution and were insistent in season and out upon war with France. They secured the support of the parliamentary cla.s.ses generally, and Pitt and his colleagues were forced to surrender to the apprehensions and demands of these elements. The war was declared by France, but it was provoked mainly by the hostile att.i.tude of the English people and government. At home all reform propaganda was stamped out, and Tories and Whigs alike throughout the quarter-century of international conflict pointed habitually to the abuses by which the upheaval in France was accompanied as indicative of what might be expected in England, or anywhere, when once the way was thrown open for unrestrained innovation.